New Year, New Problems 9: Relationship Reset
by Jlgjt
Summary: Davis's story, number nine in the series. Please be aware that is not very friendly to the DaiKari concept, so keep that in mind while reading and reviewing. Enjoy!


2004 – New Year, New Problems

Story #9: Relationship Reset

Author's Notes: This story covers Davis. Look for a few unexpected story twists, as well as seeing Davis in a rare time he actually sits down to ponder anything. :-) Enjoy!

Date: 1/3/2004

Time: 11:00 am

Place: Motomiya apartment, Davis's room.

Daisuke "Davis" Motomiya sat by his desk, looking peeved at the moment. Even he knew he should be ecstatic after the victory over which he had contributed so much too, but several things had come up in the past few days to cancel out the temporary joy...

Through the door, Davis heard DemiVeemon giggling as he played with Jun. He had introduced DemiVeemon to the family earlier in the morning, thanks in part to Jun's overreaction and DemiVeemon craftily clinging on to the back of a half-awake Davis so that he could eat something too. You can probably guess what happened next as DemiVeemon jumped off Davis's back and dashed for Jun's toast with orange marmalade, and it was partly Jun's freakout that forced Davis to tell. Nevertheless, once the secret was out, Jun had taken a liking to the Digimon, hence what Davis was hearing. But now Davis was upset at Jun, and so he sulked at hearing his sister having such fun with his Digimon partner. He alternated between wanting to going out and snatching DemiVeemon away, or wishing Jun could have a partner of her own so that she would leave DemiVeemon alone. However, Davis was disoriented enough that it was hard to focus his mind on whether to actually do anything or not.

The main problem he was facing came from the revelation, however, and knowing that he was well linked, for better or worse, with two Digidestined particularly victimized by Myotismon's reappearance: Ken Ichijouji and Kari Kamiya. The fact that it was Myotismon and not another old enemy that returned meant that the many links Davis had with both of them had twisted into one big, confusing "knot" which also acted to push his conscience into action unlike it had before...

Davis now recalled several incidents from four and a half years ago, when the first set of Digidestined were fighting Myotismon. Davis had been one of the Odaiba residents captured in Myotismon's hunt for "the Eighth Child" (who, somewhat ironically, was Kari, the girl he had later become infatuated with), and he vaguely remembered the confusion and worry of being held in the convention center with Jun and his parents as well as the raw fear he felt when he and Jun were torn away from his parents and told to line up in front of "that turncoat" (who Davis figured was Gatomon based on what he had been told by the others; he couldn't remember if he was actually stated to not be the child by Gatomon, and he wasn't about to ask her about it) to see if he was "the Eighth Child".

Davis, of course, had gotten the opportunity to figure out "the rest of the story", what happened after he was put to sleep due to the effects of DemiDevimon and then awakened later, but now these facts were pushing his conscience to yell at him for even wanting to "have" Kari. Inside, he heard things like this: "**What are you doing?!?** Thousands of kids, including yourself, suffered because of her being the eighth child! Do you even have a clue how much Kari suffered through, how much Gatomon suffered through?!? They have suffered enough already, so why were you doing things to make it worse?!? You had **NO right **to be doing that stuff to her!!!"

Davis knew it was right, but he was also hearing voices similar to those that urged him to "fight" T.K. over Kari, to "want" her to be "his girl", and Davis wondered whether the concept of an angel sitting on one shoulder and a devil sitting on the other wasn't as corny as it seemed, considering the conflicting voices he was now hearing inside. And to make things worse, Davis had also realized that MaloMyotismon could have easily tricked him with the image of them living together as husband and wife, but **only** because Davis had given up on "the fight" due to repeatedly being embarrassed in front of the others or upstaged by T.K. (and therefore making it not worth the trouble trying to push the concept) that Davis escaped the illusion's power over the others. It was a close battle, but now Davis realized just** how** close it could have been, something which embarrassed and angered him at the same time and pushed the conscience even harder.

Also involved in this was the concept of Ken and Kari being pushed closer together because of the events. Because of Davis's still-present desire to have Kari as "his girl" and also the fact that Ken was his partner due to the DNA Digivolving (a "reward" for his belief in Ken when the others didn't seem to care about him), Davis had a very mixed opinion about that, and it only added to the internal storm he was experiencing...

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Ack! It was so upsetting and confusing that Davis was getting close to pulling his hair out just to relieve the internal, frustrating stress! And now with the excuse of hiding DemiVeemon gone as well, there was nothing he could use to delay dealing with his yelling conscience. The stress was beginning to get to him, and he figured if he didn't deal with it today it was going to drive him crazy!

"But what **do** I do?" Davis asked himself.

"You already know what you should do." his conscience gently told him.

"Don't listen to him!" came another voice inside his head, the voice that had made him want Kari before. "He's just trying to embarrass you even more! Keep this to yourself and things will work out."

"You can't be selfish Davis, as that only hurts people." the conscience replied. "You've got to make it up to her! It's the only way this can be settled!"

"Settle what?" stated the other voice in his head. "You don't have anything **to** settle! You know you want Kari to be your girl, so why are you letting this get in your way? Come on, you know it's what you want, so why are you going to give it up?"

The conscience spoke again. "Remember those New Year's resolutions you didn't do? Well, this could be one of them. Davis, don't let your lower desires reopen old wounds! Every time you let your lower desires control your attitude, it just created nothing but trouble and embarrassment for you. Why won't you be the leader that defeated MaloMyotismon and helped out Ken instead of the soccer boy just wanting to get the cute girl?"

Now the other voice spoke: "Are you crazy?!? You been wanting her to show you affection ever since you first saw T.K. and Kari together, and now you're going to throw away what you **know** should be 'your girl' just because convincing others of that truth has caused trouble?!? Come on Davis, you know Kari should be your girl, **is** your girl, so act like she is your girl!"

"Ahhh! Stop torturing me!" the flesh and blood Davis now half-yelled out, pulling on his hair in the process. All he wanted was all this infighting to stop, and now! He slumped onto his desk, head in both hands, and blew out a big sigh. Of course, he knew that the "other voice" was just his hormones doing the talking for him, hormones that had caused nothing but trouble. He moaned out a bit, wishing he didn't have this dilemma...

After a few moments of just slumping on the desk, wondering if he was going crazy, he heard someone knock on the door. "Everything all right in there?" Davis heard Jun say. "I heard you shout something."

"Yeah, I'm fine." Davis said. Then, as if out of the blue, he said, "Will you let DemiVeemon in?"

"Uh, sure, OK." Jun replied. She opened the door just enough to let the little blue Digimon slip into the room, and then Jun shut it again. To Davis, she seemed perplexed by the request, and he himself didn't know where it had come from either; it just slipped out of his mouth.

DemiVeemon ran over the desk and jumped onto it, landing near Davis's right elbow. The Digimon's face immediately fell seeing Davis's stressed out look. "Something wrong, Davis?" he asked.

Davis responded with, "It's about Kari." He sighed and then continued with, "I know that she probably thinks of my actions toward her as causing nothing but trouble. I haven't been able to blame anyone but myself for all the embarrassing things I did and... well, I kinda want to start the new year off on a good note. The problem is I'd still like to think of her as 'my girl', and it's tearing into me. I can't keep going on like this, but something wants me to... something that only thinks about what I want."

"But you can't be like that, Davis." DemiVeemon replied. "You need to be a friend, just like with Ken. You can't let it be anything else, otherwise you end up getting laughed at. And I'm sure you don't like being laughed at, now do you?"

Davis grimaced at DemiVeemon's cute little smile. But of course, Davis knew his friend was right. He turned around and took a deep breath. He screwed his eyelids tight shut as he slowly pushed out, in his mind, a vow not to let his hormones run his relationship with Kari, not now, not ever! The "other voice" in his mind cried out in agony and then faded away to nothing; the battle was over, and Davis knew what to do now.

He turned around and smiled at DemiVeemon. "Will you help me out with something?" he asked his Digimon friend. Perplexed but curious, he nodded and let Davis whisper into his ear the plan he now had...

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Time: 3:00 pm

Place: Just outside Kamiya residence

Davis stood just outside the front door to the Kamiya apartment, ready to ring the doorbell. He looked down at DemiVeemon, who had in his mouth a folded slip of paper. "You ready?" Davis asked his Digimon, who nodded in response.

Davis took a big breath for courage before reaching out and ringing the doorbell. It was quickly answered by Mrs. Kamiya: "Oh, Davis, what a surprise! Are you here to meet with someone?"

"Actually, I am. Is Kari here?" Davis asked. (Meanwhile, as preplanned, DemiVeemon slipped between Mrs. Kamiya's legs and into the house...)

"Well, let me go check..." Mrs. Kamiya said as she turned to look for Kari (by this point, DemiVeemon had slipped out of direct viewing range and so was not spotted by Mrs. Kamiya; he had disappeared into another part of the apartment looking for Kari as directed by the plan he and Davis had.) She walked back into the apartment, with Davis worriedly following...

DemiVeemon had now slipped into Kari's room (after a quick peak into Tai's room before noticing it was the wrong one) through the partly-open door (because the Kamiya parents now knew about Agumon and Gatomon, there was no need to hide them behind closed doors) and ran over to Kari. She look down, naturally very surprised, and asked what he was doing here. He pointed to the paper in his mouth, which Kari took with a perplexed look. Gatomon, who had been nearby looking out towards a balcony filled with memories, turned from her reminiscence at Kari's surprised reaction and arrived by Kari's side just as Kari unfolded the sheet of paper.

Kari, now looking very confused and a bit worried, read off what had been written on the note, which went as follows:

**Roses are red**

**DemiVeemon is blue**

**Gatomon is sweet**

**But you knew that, didn't you:-)**

**Hey Kari, I just wrote that to show that I care about what happened to you, happened to Gatomon during that battle. I think we all... better understand the pain she went through... particularly Ken, and I hope you will hear me out on what I want to say to you now.**

**-Davis**

A perplexed Kari began to read the the note over again when she heard her mom speaking to some one and then a knock on her bedroom door. Her mom pushed the door open to reveal a quietly-smiling Davis.

Kari became even more surprised and began to wonder why Davis was going through all this. She adopted a "no-tolerance-on-advancement" attitude in her response. "Well, uh, the letter is nice, but isn't it a little early for Valentine's Day?" she stated, her voice turning sarcastic at the end.

Davis sighed, but didn't move. "I was afraid you were going to say that." he replied.

Kari giggled a bit and said, "Davis, you are just too predictable." She appeared to wave him off and turned to face another direction.

Davis sighed again, this time less loudly. He tried to explain, "Look, I know I've done a lot of things to make you annoyed at me, I'll admit that. You... probably won't believe I word I say now, but I **do** care, I really do! I want you to trust me on this, OK?" Davis offered a little smile as he finished.

Kari turned to face Davis again, stood up and began tapping her foot, her face turning into a small scowl. She also founded her arms in front of her chest, and stood waiting for Davis to continue...

Davis quickly got the uncomfortable feeling that he would have to make concessions in order for her to accept the offer. After a moment of awkward silence passed, Davis forced out, "I promise to stop calling you or thinking of you as 'my girl', and... you can hit me if I ever say that again." He looked with puppy-dog eyes, but got no response.

Davis sighed and tried something else, "I... promise to get T.K.'s name right from now on. Tee-Kay, **Tee-Kay**! See?" Davis smiled nervously, but no change in Kari's attitude resulted.

Davis broke out in a nervous sweat. Apparently Kari was a tougher nut to crack than he had thought. "Well, what else do you want out of me?" he exclaimed in worry and near-panic.

Kari raised a suspicious eyebrow, and Davis finally admitted total defeat: "Fine! I promise not to let DemiVeemon flirt with Gatomon." He then snapped his fingers, which caused DemiVeemon (who was currently trying to hold the attention of a completely disinterested Gatomon) to come back to Davis's side, albeit with a sour look on his face for being interrupted. He then waited for Kari's response, twittiling his thumbs while looking around at Kari's room...

Kari thought it over for a few awkwardly-silent moments, then finally decided that she had seen him sweat enough to satisfy her. She dropped her pose and said "Proposal accepted."

"For real?" a relieved Davis asked.

"Hey, both you and I know that the competition was dumb, and anything that helps end it is a plus. But don't you go getting any big ideas on me, got it?"

"Yes... uh, right... of course..." Davis stammered as his cheeks flushed red.

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"Hey, what's going on here?" Davis heard someone say as he was tapped on the shoulder. The tap made him jump a mile, but turning around Davis found it was just a curious Tai, drawn by the theatrics that had been going on.

Davis looks relieved it hadn't been someone else, but glared at Tai as both Kari and Gatomon were heard giggling based on Davis's jump. "Who asked you to put your nose in this? Go away, man." Davis stated in annoyance.

"Does that answer your question?" Tai stated, pointing to the goggles he had given Davis. In response, Davis looked up at the goggles and flushed again. His embarrassed expression showed that he wasn't going to ask that again...

Tai shook his head, and continued: "Did you know that Kari's room now has 'the balcony'?"

"'The balcony'?" Davis asked in confusion.

Tai explained: "It's a little balcony that faces out toward some wood area, but something very important happened on it four and a half years ago. Do you know what it is?"

Davis took an educated guess: "Doesn't have something to do with Gatomon?"

Tai's face lit up. "Exactly! It was on that balcony that Wizardmon brought the Digivice and Gatomon to Kari and revealed that Kari was the eighth Digidestined and that Gatomon was her Digimon!..." Tai trailed off in thought.

Davis took a moment to let all of the statement sink in. Whenever he had heard Wizardmon mentioned, it was always in a very respectful tone. As the one who had been able to give them a partial warning about Myotismon, Davis somewhat understood why he was respected, but he also realized that after hearing the story, that everyone, particularly Kari and Gatomon, considered him a true hero and, admittedly, far nobler that he could ever hope to be...

Davis slowly turned to face Kari, who just nodded slightly. Suddenly motivated by some compelling force, he stepped into Kari's room, went over to the sliding doors and slowly opened them. He stepped out onto the concrete of the balcony, and as he looked out at the woods and the city below, Davis felt like he was stepping on hallowed ground. As the others followed to look, Davis knelt down and slowly rubbed the concrete, sure he was feeling something that he had only thought could be found at the shrines and temples.

Gatomon walked out and said, eyes shining, "Now do you understand?" Davis looked up at her, thought for a moment and then slowly nodded.

Davis stood up and smiled weakly. He said, "Now, seeing it, feeling it for myself, trying to imagine it all... it makes me feel so small, you know? Wizardmon was a true hero, and he may be better than I will ever be... I... I guess it just makes the whole fighting thing seem so petty now, and divisive too..."

"So, does that mean you feel guilty about it too?" Tai asked.

Davis debated the answer to that question for a few moments, then said, "Ehh...maybe...I guess..."

"Well, will you remember Wizardmon next time something wants you to go after me?" Kari asked.

Davis nodded and promised that he would try.

"Good. Now will you leave and promise you will tell no one else about why you came here?" Kari stated.

Davis nodded and, as he was leaving, gave Gatomon a gentle pat on the head, making him feel warm and fuzzy inside (what he had once derisively called "getting the fuzzies", but now didn't seem nearly as bad as he had thought before)...

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Going back home, holding DemiVeemon in his hands, Davis felt that his ego had apparently been cut down to size... and that he didn't mind it being that way. He needed to remember "the big picture", that he was just one part of a team; an important part, but just one part nonetheless.

He looked back at the apartment building where the Kamiya's lived, and thought about Wizardmon... and Gatomon... and Kari. As he did so, he felt ashamed of every time he had to tried to grab Kari away from T.K. Each time, he had only been thinking about himself, and he was sure now that was so wrong...

He hung his head down in shame, trying very hard not to let tears start trickling down his cheeks. Davis knew that he would be fighting his hormones and "low desires" probably until either he or Kari finally did tie the knot. He also knew that he would not always be able to control his hormones under pressure, but at least now he would try. He was too ashamed of himself not too...

Davis sighed. True, he had done a lot of good stuff, but now he had to clean up the mess he had put himself in early on, mostly because he was too ashamed of his selfishness. He looked up into the sky, praying to whatever god he could think of, and hoped that when all was said and done, his good deeds would outweigh his bad deeds...

**The End**


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